Lapland (Finland)

The area of the Lapland region is 100,367 km², which consists of 92,667 km² of dry land, 6,316 km² fresh water and 1,383 km² of sea water.[10] In the south it borders the Northern Ostrobothnia region, in the west Sweden, in the north and west Norway and in the east Russia. Its borders follow three rivers: Tana, Muonio and Torne. The largest lake is Lake Inari, 1,102 km².[11] Highest point is on Halti, which reaches 1,324 m (4,344 ft) on the Finnish side of the border.[12]

The areas of Enontekiö and Utsjoki in northern Lapland are known as Fell-Lapland. The bulk and remaining Lapland is known as Forest-Lapland. Lake Inari, the many fens of the region and the Salla-Saariselkä mountains are all part of Forest-Lapland. Fell-Lapland lies in the fells of the Scandinavian Mountains. It is not made up of barren ground like blockfields but instead has a vegetation of birch forests, willow thickets or heath.[13] Common soil types in Forest-Lapland are till and sand with conifer forests growing on top. These forests show little variation across Lapland. Compared to southern Finland forest tree species grow slower. Understory is typically made of blueberry, lichens, crowberry and ling.[13]

The landscape of large parts of Lapland is an inselberg plain.[14] It has been suggested the inselberg plains were formed in the Late Cretaceous or Paleogene period by pediplanation or etchplanation.[15] Relative to southern Finland Lapland stands out for its thick till cover.[16][upper-alpha 1] The hills and mountains are typically made up of resistant rocks like granite, gneiss, quartzite and amphibolite.[13] The ice sheet that covered Finland intermittently during the Quaternary grew out from the Scandinavian Mountains.[18] The central parts of the Fennoscandian ice sheet had cold-based conditions during times of maximum extent. This means that in areas like north-east Sweden and northern Finland pre-existing landforms and deposits escaped glacier erosion and are particularly well preserved at present.[19] Northwest to southeast movement of the ice has left a field of aligned drumlins in central Lapland. Ribbed moraines found in the same area reflects a later west to east change in movement of the ice.[19] During the last deglaciation ice in Lapland retreated from the north-east, east and southeast so that the lower course of the Tornio was the last part of Finland to be deglaciated 10,100 years ago.[20] Present-day periglacial conditions in Lapland are reflected in the existence of numerous palsas, permafrost landforms developed on peat.[13]

The bedrock of Lapland belongs to the Karelian Domain occupying the bulk of the region, the Kola Domain in the northeast around Lake Inari and the Scandinavian Caledonides in the tip of Lapland's northwestern arm. With few exceptions rocks are of Archean and Proterozoic age. Granites, gneiss, metasediments and metavolcanics are common rocks while greenstone belts are recurring features.[21] More rare rock associations include mafic and ultramafic layered intrusions and one of the world's oldest ophiolites.[21][22] The region hosts valuable deposits of gold, chromium, iron and phosphate.[23]

Climate

The Luosto inselberg from air.

The very first snowflakes fall to the ground in late August or early September over the higher peaks. The first ground-covering snow arrives on average in October or late September. Permanent snow cover comes between mid-October and the end of November, significantly earlier than in southern Finland. The winter is long, approximately seven months. The snow cover is usually thickest in early April. Soon after that the snow cover starts to melt fast.[24] The thickest snow cover ever was measured in Kilpisjärvi in 19 April 1997 and it was 190 cm.[25] The annual mean temperature varies from a couple of degrees below zero in the northwest to a couple of degrees above zero in the southwest (Kemi-Tornio area). Lapland exhibits a trend of increasing precipitation towards the south, with the dryest parts being located at the two arms.[26]

Summer months, the average temperature is consistently over 10°C. Heat waves with daily temperatures exceeding +25 °C, occur average 5-10 days per summer in northern Finland.[27]

Wehrmacht soldiers with a local Sami reindeer herder in Lappland, Sodankylä, Finland 1942.

The area of Lapland was split between two counties of the Swedish Realm from 1634 to 1809. The northern and western areas were part of Västerbotten County, while the southern areas (so-called Peräpohjola) were part of Ostrobothnia County (after 1755 Oulu County). The northern and western areas were transferred in 1809 to Oulu County, which became Oulu Province. Under the royalist constitution of Finland during the first half of 1918, Lapland was to become a Grand Principality and part of the inheritance of the proposed king of Finland. Lapland Province was separated from Oulu Province in 1938.

During the Interim Peace and beginning of the Continuation War the government of Finland allowed the Nazi German Army to station itself in Lapland as a part of Operation Barbarossa. After Finland made a separate peace with the Soviet Union in 1944, the Soviet Union demanded that Finland expel the German army from its soil. The result was the Lapland War, during which almost the whole civilian population of Lapland was evacuated. The Germans used scorched earth tactics in Lapland, before they withdrew to Norway. Forty to forty-seven percent of the dwellings in Lapland and 417 kilometres (259 mi) of railroads were destroyed, 9,500 kilometres (5,900 mi) of roadways were mined, destroyed or were unusable, and 675 bridges and 3,700 kilometres (2,300 mi) of telephone lines were also destroyed. Ninety percent of Rovaniemi, the capital of Lapland, was burned to the ground, with only a few pre-war buildings surviving the destruction.

After the Second World War, Petsamo municipality and part of Salla municipality were ceded to the Soviet Union. The decades following the war were a period of rebuilding, industrialization and fast economic growth. Large hydroelectric plants and mines were established and cities, roads and bridges were rebuilt from the destruction of the war. In the late 20th century the economy of Lapland started to decline, mines and factories became unprofitable and the population started to decline rapidly across most of the region.

The provinces of Finland were abolished on 1 January 2010, but Lapland was reorganised as one of the new regions that replaced them.[28]

Lapland is the home of about 3.4% of Finland's total population, and is by far the least densely populated area in the country. The biggest towns in Lapland are Rovaniemi (the regional capital), Tornio, and Kemi. In 2011, Lapland had a population of 183,320 of whom 177,950 spoke Finnish, 1,526 spoke Sami, 387 spoke Swedish and 3,467 spoke some other languages as their mother tongue. [32] Of the Sami languages, Northern Sami, Inari Sami and Skolt Sami are spoken in the region. Pelkosenniemi is the smallest municipality in mainland Finland in terms of population, while Savukoski is sparsely populated in terms of population density.[33]

Lapland's population has been in decline since 1990.

People with a foreign background[34][35]
Country of origin	Population (2017)
Sweden	3,087
Russia	942
Myanmar	415
Iraq	256
Thailand	245
Syria	244
Estonia	195
Norway	192
Germany	187
Afghanistan	183
China	182
Vietnam	172
Somalia	169
Turkey	122
United Kingdom	107

Sámi family in Lapland, 1936.

Municipalities

Traffic in Lapland

The region of Lapland is made up of 21 municipalities, of which four have city status (marked in bold).

Municipalities by population (cities marked as bold)

	Municipality	Population (31.12.2018)	Area (km²)	Density (pop. per km²)	Sub-Region
	Rovaniemi	62,963	8,016.84	7.85	Rovaniemi
	Tornio	21,872	1,348.85	18.84	Kemi-Tornio
	Kemi	21,024	747.51	232.23	Kemi-Tornio
	Sodankylä	8,442	12,415.48	0.76	Northern Lapland
	Keminmaa	8,149	647.23	13.69	Kemi-Tornio
	Kemijärvi	7,375	3,930.91	2.29	Eastern Lapland
	Inari	6,911	17,333.54	0.45	Northern Lapland
	Kittilä	6,423	8,262.94	0.79	Fell Lapland
	Ylitornio	4,017	2,212.38	2.22	Torne Valley
	Ranua	3,895	3,694.80	1.21	Rovaniemi
	Kolari	3,824	2,617.77	1.51	Fell Lapland
	Salla	3,493	5,873.08	0.68	Eastern Lapland
	Pello	3,439	1,863.68	2.17	Torne Valley
	Posio	3,236	3,544.81	1.20	Eastern Lapland
	Tervola	3,063	1,592.04	2.12	Kemi-Tornio
	Simo	3,044	2,086.39	2.34	Kemi-Tornio
	Muonio	2,302	2,037.80	1.25	Fell Lapland
	Enontekiö	1,856	8,391.35	0.24	Fell Lapland
	Utsjoki	1,232	5,372.01	0.25	Northern Lapland
	Savukoski	1,016	6,495.95	0.17	Eastern Lapland
	Pelkosenniemi	954	1,881.57	0.53	Eastern Lapland
	Total	178,530	100,366.93	1.78

• Finnish Lakeland
• Lääni
• Lapland War
• Laponia (historical province of Finland)
• Lappmarken
• National parks in Lapland
• Sami people
• Sápmi (area)
• Sea Lapland
• Southern Lapland

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Lapland, Finland.

Wikivoyage has a travel guide for Finnish Lapland.

• Lapland Regional Council – Official site
• House of Lapland
• Lapland State Provincial Office – Official site
• Lapland Club
• Kemi-Tornio University of Applied Sciences – video portal – Videos about Lapland experiences and lifestyle.
• Levi-Lapland – Information on Lapland, the ski resorts and the Lapland Super Pass.
• Where is Lapland?
• Midnight Sun Film Festival